Martin Taylor and Lee Taylor will be watching Gethin at Sandown on Saturday after selling the colt to Wathnan Racing. Clacton sits in the middle of that move because the Taylors still have a stake in what happens next, even if they no longer own him.
Martin Taylor said the sale became harder to resist once the risk began to outweigh the reward. "It was difficult but, with all the risk involved with horses, you just have to do it at some stage," he said. "It reaches a point where the risk starts to outweigh the reward. It's bittersweet, but we're still invested in the family, so we still have a big interest in him running well on Saturday."
Gethin's Coral-Eclipse run
Gethin, trained by Owen Burrows, goes into the Coral-Eclipse after winning the Listed Magnolia Stakes at Kempton on his penultimate racecourse appearance. Richard Brown said Wathnan Racing had been watching the colt for at least 18 months, while Taylor said the offer arrived only a few weeks before the sale.
That sequence leaves the Taylors on both sides of the same race day: they no longer control Gethin, but they still follow him through Saturday's Coral-Eclipse. For readers, the practical change is simple enough — the colt now runs for Wathnan Racing, and the family that sold him will be measuring the deal against what he does at Sandown.
Aniseed at Tattersalls
The sale also sits inside a longer breeding story. Martin Taylor said, "We bought Gethin's dam as a yearling in 2010," referring to Aniseed, the Dalakhani mare bought with Liam Norris for 60,000gns at Book 1 of the Tattersalls October Yearling Sale. He added, "I loved Dalakhani as a broodmare sire, so we bought her with a view to being a broodmare."
Aniseed is 17 years old, reached a BHA rating of 98, and was twice placed at Listed level. Her first foal by Shamardal was Global Giant, who won three Listed races and was second in Bahrain one year. Martin Taylor said the family is still building around her line, with an alternate year breeding pattern and Aniseed now in foal to Ghaiyyath.
Gethin is the first of her three foals by Ghaiyyath, whose own record includes the Eclipse and the Longines World's Best Racehorse for 2020. A two-year-old from the same cross was sold for 200,000gns at the Tattersalls December Foal Sale and went to Darley Japan, but Taylor said that foal did not resemble Gethin. "He didn't look like Gethin as a foal. I don't know what he looks like n," he said.
What readers are left with is a straightforward test of value: a colt bought into the family line is now running in a major race for a new owner, and the Taylors will judge the sale by what Gethin does at Sandown on Saturday.
